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The iPhone 4S may have been an evolutionary upgrade, but sales seem to be quite brisk nonetheless. Apple reported Monday morning that the device sold over four million units during its first weekend on the market in seven countries, breaking all previous iPhone sales records.

Apple started taking preorders for the iPhone 4S on October 7 for the US, Canada, Australia, UK, France, Germany, and Japan. After a single day of preorders, Apple previously said that over 1 million users had reserved the device for an October 14 delivery date, which in itself was a new one-day sales record. The device officially launched last Friday, with the usual long lines at Apple retail locations across the US and elsewhere. All told, the company sold over 4 million iPhone 4S devices over the weekend.

No information was available this morning about sales of the $99 8GB iPhone 4 or the free-with-contract iPhone 3GS, both of which Apple is continuing to offer as lower-priced alternatives to its latest hardware.

Despite the impressive launch sales, it's worth comparing to the first weekend for the iPhone 4 to give some context. That device was only available in five countries at launch, excluding Canada and Australia. Server problems caused hassles for some would-be customers, especially on AT&T. And let's not forget that Apple didn't have a white version of the iPhone 4 available, which by many accounts appears to be far more popular than expected. We should also note that with the longer than usual upgrade cycle, far more users were “upgrade eligible” this time around. Given all the issues, it's somewhat surprising Apple sold 1.7 million iPhone 4 units in just three days.

Still, four million sales is nothing to sneeze at, and Apple SVP of Worldwide Marketing, Phil Schiller, was quick to brag about the numbers. “iPhone 4S is off to a great start with more than four million sold in its first weekend—the most ever for a phone and more than double the iPhone 4 launch during its first three days,” he said in a statement, calling the iPhone 4S “the best iPhone ever.”